Genre: YA Contemporary
Pro-Feminist Content: ★★★
Rage-Induction: >:( >:(
After the lovely book that was The Possibilities of Sainthood, I was looking forward to another religion-themed YA contemporary novel. I thought A World Away would be a good second choice as its main character, Eliza, is Amish. My main line of thinking was that this is a fringe group that I know little about, other than my preconceived notions from media, and I thought again I would be pleasantly surprised.
I think this is the first time since I started blogging where the good feminist message has been overshadowed by the weak writing. Honestly the second >:( of the rage-induction score has to do with how pathetically weak the writing is, more than an anti-feminist or other -ist character/situation.
We initially meet Eliza during one of the weekly dinners her mother hosts, where "English" (AKA all non-Amish, regardless of ethnicity) tourists gawk at their plain clothes and lack of electricity. I don't really understand the point of the dinners; ostensibly it's for each side to learn a little more about one another. However Eliza barely talks during these dinners, and her mother seems reluctant to really communicate, instead using a fake smile and not going into great detail. The English tourists also tend not to say much, or even talk about their lives.
We learn Eliza just turned 16 and (once parental approval is granted) about to start her rumspringa, which is a rite-of-passage for young Amish. At the age of 16, they have a year to live as an English teenager might, meaning they can listen to music, wear "normal" clothing (e.g. clothes with buttons, zippers, etc.), and some even go work in the English world. One of the visitors at dinner sees Eliza working at the inn and asks her if she could be a nanny to her two children while the mother writes her graduate thesis.
Eliza is excited for the opportunity to explore the outside world, but she explains to the reader the dilemma she faces: at the end of rumspringa, each person needs to make the choice of whether stay in the community and become baptised as full Amish or leave the community entirely. Eliza mentions one of her friends' brother ended up not getting baptized, and although at first he communicated regularly with his family, eventually the letters stopped coming. She explains that if she does get baptized but decides to leave after, then she will get shunned, which means basically ceasing all communication with the Amish community. Thus, Eliza's mother fears her leaving, and Eliza overhears her saying, "'I'd rather have her unhappy at home than happy there.'" (pg 28)
We learn little about Eliza's family and friends before her mother relents to her working at Rachel Aster's house: her older sister never wanted to leave and immediately married after her rumspringa, and her brother did an apprenticeship (and though he wanted to stay, he came back because he knew his father needed him). Eliza has two "close" friends (she doesn't interact with people; this title seems in name only as Eliza seems more into narrating than interacting with people), and is being courted by a calm young man named Daniel.
When Eliza arrives at Rachel's house, she's initially shocked by all the devices and the strange environment. She notes that work is more convenient, but that the devices take away from face-to-face communication and family togetherness. As is standard for a YA novel, she soon meets a cute young English boy (Josh) who teaches her about music, and they start a romance.
A lot of the novel is taken up by the average teen's social life that is very foreign to Eliza, but it is so mundane to us. Eliza's observations are rather trite, and I got bored of her analysis of clothing and makeup and her desire to look like the soon-to-be mean girl Valerie. The romance between Eliza and Josh is likewise boring; there isn't much the two of them have in common. What is distressing here is that while initially Eliza tells us that she wanted to go to school past 8th grade, she doesn't ask a single question about Josh and his school until he starts school again during fall. That leaves the entire summer where she's just sitting around reading novels and dating, but not trying to find out the world in a different manner. I don't know why the lack of intellectual curiosity bothers me, but it does. Maybe it's because as soon as I hear Josh talking about his goal of becoming a sportswriter, I realized that the relationship is doomed: it's hard to have a relationship when educational drives differ.
We eventually learn the source behind Eliza's mother's fear of the English world. Spoiler alert: Eliza's mother had a younger sister who was shunned after she fell in love with an English man and left the community, and that Eliza's mother had a child with an English man herself--Eliza's elder sister Margaret.
Eliza's return to the community seems rushed. She leaves because she realizes that Rachel Aster's thesis topic was Amish teens, and that Rachel might have been writing about her. Although it is clarified that Rachel WASN'T writing about Eliza and they make amends, it seems like this crystallizes Eliza's conviction that she doesn't belong in the English world. It is only at the end when Eliza's aunt Beth points out she can return to the Amish world but still see the outside, and gives examples of Amish women working in the outside world (a teacher and a veterinary assistant). It would have been nice if these women were pointed out in the beginning, but since Grossman doesn't do the work in the beginning to describe the Amish community members, it seems hastily tacked-on.
The lack of world-building also made the distinction between true shunning and choosing to leave before baptism weren't made clear. Kate's brother who left before baptism is still mentioned by community members, though it's still considered a sad thing, but Aunt Beth isn't mentioned by ANYONE, so Eliza doesn't even know of Beth's existence until her mother writes her. While I don't condone the harsh measures to keep certain faiths closed, they're still an important part of what defines those religions. For example, I'm Hindu, and central to Hinduism is the idea that you can live a good life and go to heaven, but that in order to be Hindu, one must be born Hindu. Likewise, the Amish are presented as having a closed faith. Moreover, it is repeatedly emphasized in the beginning that being Amish is a choice. It seems that the sadness about Kate's brother leaving the community is because he chose to stop communicating with his Amish family; he was never baptized and therefore is not shunned. It would have been nice to see someone who left, but still had somewhat frequent communication with their family as a counterpoint to Kate's brother.
Thus, Beth's story to me is more moving. It does seem unnecessarily harsh to shun her, but at the same time, she did it knowing the consequences of her choice, and that's what makes me sympathetic.
Overall the theme of choices is what makes this a somewhat feminist book, though the actions leading to plot resolution are not. It's not anti-feminist to go back to the Amish way, and in fact Eliza makes a point in saying she isn't going back because she hates Josh/loves Daniel more, but because she's going back because of a misunderstanding rather than true desire to be Amish. In the end, though, I didn't care what message was being conveyed, as I just got bored of Eliza and her life.
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